Who thought the humble laptop display would be the focus of a spec war? Apple's Retina display beat the Chromebook Pixel, and now everyone else needs to catch up. That might explain Samsung's announcement today that its Series 9 Premium Ultrabook is getting a bump-up in its screen resolution.

Image: Samsung

Whereas the 13.3-inch Series 9 notebook once had a 1,600x900-pixel resolution, the improved NP900X3E-A03US now sports a full 1080p (1,920x1,080) HD screen. It still can't match the MacBook Pro's 2,560x1,600 Retina display, or the Pixel's 2,560x1,700, but it does manage to show 40 percent more content than the previous generation did.

The LED-backlit screen continues to use Samsung's SuperBright technology, which the company claims makes the display 50 percent brighter than a standard laptop monitor. Other specs for this configuration include an Intel Core i7-3517U processor, 4GB of RAM, a 256GB solid state drive, and Windows 8 Pro, all in a package that weighs 2.56 pounds and is a mere 0.51 inches at its thinnest point.

Nothing svelte about this particular Series 9 Premium Ultrabook's price tag, however. It will set you back $1,899.99 unless you want to wait to see if the even higher-res Series 9 prototype ever emerges as an official product.

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